Networking From Your Chair!

November 6, 2007 · Filed Under Networking, WAHM, Work At Home Expo, working from home

You know, if you’re a work at home parent – how hard it is to ‘take any time off’ from the house to network and promote your business. What if there was a way to network and share your business without leaving the house.

Let’s say there’s a great event that your company or an association you deal with is putting on over a two day period, somewhere that involves a short flight to get to. You would love to attend (but, but, but), let’s review all this entails, shall we?

• Babysitters – possibly more than one, or maybe writing a manual on how to care for the children and the house for your significant other. This may also involve your partner rearranging their schedule – this may take some hand holding or arm wrestling.

• Preparing a detailed schedule of places, times and supplies needed for the birthday party, Kindermusik and soccer game that will take place while Mom’s out gallivanting around. How DARE she!

• Pet-sitters or arranging a place for them to go while you’re gone. Feeling guilty because you know they are going to be miserable without you.

• Meal planning – taking into consideration the kids only eat things Mom makes, which means they’re going to be living on pizza, cereal and fast food. Can we say cranky and demanding kids when mom returns? Oh wait, that’s normal, forget that one.

• Grocery shopping – probably with the kids since it’s the only ‘quality’ time you’ll get with them before you go.

• Packing - Pack light because you know that you’ll have to leave the car behind and take local transit to get to where you need to be. Sacrificing, so your partner can do what needs to be done while you’re gone.

• Hotel arrangements – the cheapest dirtiest place, furthest from where you need to be because you feel guilty about spending money on something as frivolous as a hotel.

• Flight arrangements – the red eye – cause it was $150 cheaper and you can’t take THREE days off. Plus it’s easier to sneak away in the middle of the night otherwise you’d be attending your event with a kid on each leg.

• Cleaning the house – only to come back to a place worse off than when you left including a week’s worth of laundry and dishes.

• Getting everything related to your work taken care of so that you don’t have to worry about it for two days. Hoping you don’t lose a customer because you didn’t answer their email or phone call within an hour of receiving it or because you weren’t there when they came by to drop off an order.

Do we agree? It takes a few weeks of a whole lot of planning, arguing, negotiating and guilt just to leave the house for two days.

Let’s not even get into the aftermath of taking two days off. You pretty much have to do it all again, while dealing with the kids – who’ve gotten their own way and liked it, pets – that won’t leave your side and follow you everywhere and a partner that’s disappeared for some alone time because two days with full responsibility almost put them in a coma.

But you want to go! So you do it all and then some.

Your event will have networking opportunities in a social setting as well as learning opportunities from people that you look up to and admire. Networking with people that have things in common with you is important for your business and it will all pay off in the long run. Plus it will be a blast! Full on adult conversations not interrupted by a screaming child, dressing up in clothes that won’t get wiped on or spilled upon unless you get a little out of hand during the social event. Justify, justify, justify.

You can do all of this without the hassle if you’re someone that attends online events. No flight, no hotel, Mom is home and taking care of everything, no aftermath, no guilt and no planning. You get to network, socialize and share your business or products with people eliminating the obstacles involved with an in person event.

Forums, Yahoo or Google Groups, Blogs, Blog Comments, Text Chats, Audio Chats, MySpace, Ryze, Networks, Facebook, the list is endless… all places you can network and have conversations from the comfort of your chair. Do yourself, your kids and your partner a favor and explore the opportunities that are available to you right from where you read this article.

Wendy Cooper – A work at home mom, Virtual Assistant and Online Event Organizer who built her business networking online loves helping other work at home business owners realize the value of building relationships from the comfort of their chair. For an awesome, real time opportunity to share your business, products or resources visit http://www.thewahexpo.com

Tags: